Mar 1 - Sunday night. We hang our heads in shame for not having properly updated our blog in 2009... an indication of yet another busy year!
Last time I mailed I sat on the couch knowing that Tim would be gone for a full 5 weeks. Luckily, Exceed came to the rescue and I ended up working in Aberdeen from January 13 - 31. I hated having to leave Gandalf behind, but I loved the opportunity of a few weeks of work in an office environment, helping with the re-launch of our website and marketing materials. The weather in the UK was GREAT. It was around 5 degrees Celsius most days and just around freezing point at night. I went for a few early morning runs and loved the crisp cold.
As part of the trip to the UK, I also got to join Ian (Exceed's owner) for a 2-day workshop in Amsterdam, Holland. I had no official 'job' other than sitting in the back and observing, looking for ways to improve how we run this particular type of workshop. I had great fun as the hotel had messed up on a number of fronts and I, being the only Dutchie, got to fix it ... I so enjoyed being in a country where everything works smoothly and people are actually willing and eager to work with you and serve the customer ... a rare experience living in South Africa :).
While I was in the UK, Sue held down the fort (as usual) in Cape Town, taking care of Gandalf and helping us getting the various things done 'back home'. One of those things was Tim's bakkie ... it had a number of scratches and scrapes on the hood and bumper which couldn't be polished out and the rims were slowly but surely losing their alloy paint so I decided to surprise Tim by getting various things re-sprayed. Well, it worked! I arrived back in Cape Town a day before Tim. Gandalf was thrilled to have his mummy home, Tim's bakkie was looking great ... and our garden was infested by army worm. I'd never heard of these things before. All I knew was that the garden was literally alive with these green things and that the grass was looking awefully brown. It took some serious effort and very serious fertiliser with 'army worm killing ingredients' to get the lawn right again, but only a few weeks later it's pretty much there! Just in time for our friends, Hans & Marjan and their kiddies Meike & Jop, from Holland who arrived on Friday night and are staying for the nexst 4 weeks.
Anyway, moving on from the army worm ... it was so exciting to collect Tim from the airport that Sunday evening. This was a his longest hitch to date and the extra week was pretty tough on both of us. I took Gandalf with to the airport again, and he was equally excited to see Tim. He really sees Tim as his playmate - unlike his boring mum - particularly for walks in the forest when Tim tries to outsprint Gandalf ... easy when he was only 5 monts old, but impossible today.
We had a fantastic month together at home. I was quite busy with Exceed work (new website going live) and Tim had his coaching course and ChallengerWorld, but we still really managed to have some good quality time together. The two highlights of this trip were first of all the fact that after many many 'gruelling' assignments and a final 4-day course, Tim passed his final test (including coaching an innocent victim live in front of a panel of judges ... all this of course also being recorded on video) and is now a qualified Professsional Integral Coach. An absolutely huge accomplishment as well as a huge relief after a year of long, difficult, and intense assignments and course weekends.
Our second highlight was our 2-year wedding anniversary, which we celebrated by going to a lovely guest house 'Val d'Or' in Franschhoek. We spent two nights there, just to make sure we got at least a full day away from home. Having dropped off Gandalf at Tim's Mum on our way out, we arrived at our guest house around 6PM on Monday evening, but promplty had to turn around and head back home to pick up a few important things we forgot. We were back at the B&B by 10PM, had a lovely lie in the next day, followed by a massage, a dip in the pool, and a wander around Franschhoek. We spent our anniversary dinner at a lovely little restaurant in Franschhoek and shared a bottle of champagne to celebrate the occasion. We're so blessed!
Meanwhile, Tim is off again, but luckily only for two weeks this time. Plus, Hans & Marjan arrived the same day Tim left, so it's certainly making this hitch easier for me, with great friends around at least for the first week... I talked Hans into doing the Cape Argus with me this year ... he doesn't quite know what he's got himself into (a 109KM cycle ride with the mandatory set of hills along the way) but he's excited and we're just going to make it a fun ride ... very much looking forward to it, but anticipating some uncomfortable moments in the saddle since I didn't have a chance to practice at all this year!
Time to go ... work has been extremely busy with another busy week ahead. Between the work in Aberdeen and increased Cape Leadership work around Cape Town, it's amazing how busy we already seem to be again!
Hope this finds you all well, happy and healthy...
We arrived at the start, knowing it was going to be a windy day, but still shocked to see the wind had already caused havoc with the various branding that normally decorates the start area. All that was left were a few shreds of fabric blowing in the wind. Rather than the usual high adrenalin ‘pedal to the metal’ start, we found ourselves barely being able to walk once the start gun went… let alone get on our bikes. Even more disconcerting was the number of cyclists on the N2, cycling back to the start as we were busy conquering the first hill. We were in for a tough ride …
